Colts v FinalCC match report

I am afraid this is another season where we have lost our first game. We lost the toss and they decided to bat and made 143 for 5.

Our fielding was clearly rusty, but whilst we didn’t bowl many wides, there were also far too many 6 balls. I think we most have conceded at least 6x6s, which made up for quite a few dot balls we achieved inbetween. I screwed up clearly on one occasion on the back wall and several others perhaps could have been stopped, but were so close to actually hitting the corner it was difficult to slide behind the ball. John Cal, bowled very well throughout his spell as did Mike and Dave in their last two overs who stopped their total creeping completely out of reach.

Mike and Dave opened and started confidently in the first two overs and we were up with the run rate. Then sadly Dave hit the cage which is normally a certain run, but unusually tha ball rebounded much more than expected and when Mike called “no”, Dave was stranded. Steve joined Mike and again continued to push the score along at the required rate, but sadly didn’t quite follow through with shot that could have gone for 10, but there was a fine running catch taken on the backwall off the fielder’s boots. I joined Mike, who then retired on a quickly made 25, but I didn’t last long, moving across my stumpts too far to expose my leg stump. Trevor also didn’t last long, leaving Mike and John as the last pair, with plenty of work to do. On the positive side, we had always remained up with the run rate, but then Mike was given out to a very rare LBW, which looked out, but was a bit unbalanced as we had had 4 good shouts when the new pink ball kept low. John however then played a blinder hitting an 8 off their best bowler and taking 19 off his last but one over. It went down to the last over, we needed 12 to win, they needed one wicket. The first two balls were dots, so John felt then need for big hit, but didn’t get it straight enough, hitting the sidewall hard but going straight back to the bowler. We were 132 all out, with John making 43, clearly our man of the match. However overall, we really just didn’t do well enough.